One Night with the Major Read online

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Bran. That’s very kind.’ Pavia was touched by the older woman’s words. She had expected far more Mrs Brownings than Mrs Brans when she’d started this adventure. She cleared her throat, struggling with a moment of emotion. ‘If you’ll excuse me, I should probably go and check on the others.’

  Pavia stepped out of the kitchen, swiping at sudden tears brought on by Mrs Bran’s kindness, and nearly ran into Cam. ‘There you are!’ Cam grabbed her by the forearms. His hair was a mess and he had what looked like paint stains on his shirt. His sleeves were rolled up and his breeches were dusty. Whatever he’d been up to, he’d been at it hard and enjoying it. She thought he’d never looked handsomer.

  ‘I’ve been looking for you all over, Pavia. I want to show you something.’ He was boyishly charming in his excitement and she let him tug her outside. ‘Now, close your eyes,’ Cam ordered playfully. ‘Don’t look until I tell you to, I won’t let you trip.’ She took a few tentative steps, letting him manoeuvre her into place. ‘All right, now, look!’

  Before her on the lawn was a set of four narrow straight-backed chairs, glistening with a rosewood stain. One chair had a scratch on its back, another had a gouge on the right leg, but they were a set and she had an inkling of how Cam’s shirt might have got dirty. ‘We found them in the attic and I stained them myself,’ Cam announced proudly. ‘Do you like them?’

  ‘Are these the chairs you were telling me about?’ She trailed a hand over the surface of one, feeling more tears sting her eyes at this memory come to life. ‘I love them.’ She would have loved them if they’d been scarred and three-legged, because they were a product of his effort. In that moment, she felt a kinship with her new husband. She wasn’t the only one trying to learn a new role. While she’d been in the kitchen, trying to guess menus he’d like, he’d been out here, the grandson of an earl, trying his hand at a little carpentry and painting. She reached up on tiptoe and kissed the corner of his mouth. ‘Truly, they are wonderful.’

  ‘I was able to sand out most of the scratches,’ Cam said, a little more modestly now. ‘There were some I couldn’t get, like the one on the back here.’ His voice dropped and he took her hand. ‘If you don’t like them, we can still get new. We can find a way to afford it.’

  Pavia shook her head, not letting him finish. ‘No, I wouldn’t think of ordering new when we have these chairs to hand. I would much rather have something my husband made, something our neighbours did for us, than something impersonal from a factory.’ In any case, it would be rude to refuse all that was being so generously offered today. They had a lifetime to redecorate. She beamed up at him. ‘Would you like to know how I spent my morning? I made menus for Mrs Bran and she wants to try aloo gobi.’ It was such a simple statement, but it carried a wealth of meaning and it warmed her inexplicably that the one person who understood it all was her husband. He knew how momentous it was. He shared her joy in the little victory. Not for the first time, she thought there was hope for them, hope that they would make something of this marriage.

  Cam grinned. ‘See, not everyone is as close-minded as the Brownings.’ He nodded towards a pair of men bringing out a table. ‘I suppose if you have menus ready, I’d better see to making sure you have a table to serve them on.’

  Pavia gasped. ‘Is that the table? The one where you ate two servings of green beans in one night?’

  Cam’s eyes danced. ‘The very same.’

  ‘Did I hear the words “dining table”?’ Mrs Danson bustled up. ‘Perfect timing! We have a box of table linens for you to go through, my dear, enough to get you started at least.’

  ‘Yes, you did, the table’s right over there.’ Pavia beamed at the Vicar’s wife. ‘Have you seen these chairs yet? My husband re-did them. Aren’t they lovely?’ Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Cam stand a little straighter. The compliment pleased him, as she wanted it to. If this week of honeymooning had taught her anything it was that they had a lot to learn about each other if this marriage was going to be as much of a success out of bed as it was in. It would be up to the two them to work on it together. Today, for the first time since the wedding, she understood how much she wanted this marriage to work, not just for her child but for her.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Cam didn’t have a chance to speak to his wife again until nearly dusk. But he was aware of her, keeping her in his sightline as he repaired a leg on the otherwise perfectly good dining table, and helped replace a wheel on the gig in the barn. It would be good to have something to drive to church on Sundays and into town. He didn’t like the idea of Pavia walking too far, or having to carry packages on the return as her pregnancy progressed.

  He leaned against the gig, watching her with the other women for a moment as they sorted quilts. He couldn’t hear what she said, but occasionally her laughter floated back to him as she chatted. She was doing splendidly and the sight of her brought a proud tightness to his chest. She was his wife. His to cherish, his to protect for all his days. He’d not thought to feel this way about his marriage of convenience. He’d expected to love his child. He’d expected to grow a fondness for the woman who gave him that child. He’d not expected to fall for her. Fall? What did that mean? Surely not love. He was too worldly, too honest for that. Theirs was not a love match. But there were feelings, strong feelings growing within him for her that far outpaced the fondness and respect he’d expected. What he felt for her was more than esteem, but he had no name for it and it left him feeling emotionally at sea where Pavia was concerned. For a decisive man, the feeling was unnerving.

  Despite the trials of yesterday, it was right to have brought her here, to the village where he’d known some happiness in his rigid childhood. This place was unlike London, where they would be questioned and ridiculed, where every step forward would be a fight, where every visit and friendship would be evaluated as a power play or an alliance. Here in Little Trull, they would be surrounded by people who would become their friends as he and Pavia made a place for themselves in the community, helping others in turn as those neighbours had helped them today. That’s how small villages worked; neighbours cared for neighbours. Neighbours set aside their differences when the village had needs.

  Today had been a significant start. The villagers had outdone themselves with their time and generosity, although he was aware there were those who’d chosen not to come. Still, Cam had every hope that, eventually, opposition would be overcome as he and Pavia bonded with the community through daily tasks: helping with harvests, building barns, bringing baskets to the sick. Whatever was needed, Cam would make sure they contributed.

  The manse was already looking more like a home. Cam could see women in the windows hanging the last of the curtains. He could smell Mrs Bran’s dinner drifting out into the evening air. He heard the laughter of the women upstairs finishing the last of the beds. Soon, all the villagers would go home and it would just be the two of them and that was fine, too.

  Cam smiled. He could hardly wait to enjoy the house with her, to sit with her at the table. She was easy to talk with, a good listener. She’d enjoyed his stories and laughed with him. She’d nursed his headache, shown him compassion when it would have been easy to withdraw, embarrassed by his nightmares. She would be a good mother. Not only a mother. She would be a good wife.

  Pavia had been a revelation today. Watching her with the other women had done something for his heart. He knew how difficult this was for her, how overwhelming. She worried about being accepted. And yet, today, she’d given her all, knowing how important this was for them, but especially for him. He would need to thank her for that tonight. This was a homecoming of sorts for him. But it was a proving ground for her. Pavia was among strangers, many of whom she felt would judge her suitability as a wife for him. At least this morning that had been true. Something had happened throughout the day as everyone had worked together. He’d seen her relax, seen her confidence come to the fo
re. As the day progressed, she was not among strangers any more, but friends.

  ‘Major, might I have a moment?’ An older man, Martin Kinsley, approached. He gestured towards his wagon. ‘I brought something over for you and your wife. My Alma told me you’re expecting already.’ He winked. ‘You didn’t waste much time.’

  ‘I’ve already wasted too much, some would say.’ Cam laughed and clapped the man on the shoulder, gesturing for Pavia to join him at the wagon.

  ‘Mrs Lithgow, I was just telling your husband, Alma and I have a little something for your little something.’ He drew back the tarp covering the item in the wagon bed, revealing a hand-carved oak cradle. Pavia gasped and Cam could see tears welling up in her eyes over the gift.

  ‘It’s too lovely, it’s too much,’ Pavia said. They’d drawn a crowd as people finished their final tasks.

  ‘It’s not too much,’ Martin insisted. ‘Our children are grown and have half-grown children of their own. This cradle is just sitting up in the hayloft getting old when it might be sitting in your nursery getting used. I polished it up today myself while everyone was working.’

  ‘We would be honoured, Martin.’ Cam shook the man’s hand. ‘Would you help me take it inside? Vicar, would you bless it?’

  Vicar Danson cleared his throat and the neighbours bowed their heads around the wagon. Cam slipped his hand around Pavia’s. This was a ‘for ever’ moment, a moment he never wanted to forget: the Vicar’s voice in the twilight, his neighbours gathered about him, his wife beside him, his child growing in her belly, as they celebrated the gift of a cradle.

  For the first time in months there was peace in his heart, a voice inside him that whispered, This is why you lived; so you could come home and have a family. Cam smiled quietly to himself, his head bowed. Can you see me, Fortis? Can you forgive me if I don’t come back? I am family man now. I am going to have a child. I don’t know how I can be both soldier and father. It was a dilemma he was going to have to resolve soon. But not tonight.

  The cradle was delivered with much fuss, the women already talking about soft blankets of local alpaca wool for the baby, while the men heaved it upstairs. Then it was time for the neighbours to find their own homes. Pavia stood beside him as they thanked each of those who’d come to work.

  Mrs Bran was the last to leave. ‘Don’t wait too long to eat—dinner’s on the table. I’ll be here early in the morning.’ She paused and patted Cam’s cheek. ‘It’s good to have you home, dear boy.’

  Cam saw Mrs Bran off and returned to where Pavia waited for him out front. It was late, stars pushing through the dark sky in brilliant pinpoints. They stood for a moment, looking at the manse. Someone had left a lamp burning in an upstairs window. It looked homely. It looked like place for a family, a real family, a family that loved and perhaps sometimes even fought, a family that was nothing like the one he’d had. ‘Mrs Lithgow, may I carry you over the threshold?’

  Pavia laughed up at him. ‘I thought you already did that?’

  ‘This time I have it on good authority the door won’t stick. Besides, I want to do it once more before you get too heavy to carry.’ Cam swung his wife up into his arms and they both laughed. His heart swelled. Life was good, which was something he hadn’t been able to say for a very long time.

  * * *

  Life was not perfect, but it was good. Perhaps good was enough, Pavia reflected as she glanced around the sewing circle at the blanket committee meeting. These women were becoming her friends. They laughed and chatted with her. They sought advice on needlework from her after admiring her own embroidery. Pavia smiled privately to herself as she pushed a needle through the cloth. Who would have thought needlecraft could be a diplomatic tool, bringing people together? But it had.

  ‘You’re smiling, Pavia.’ Next to her, Letty Weldon gave her elbow a friendly bump as she teased, ‘You must be thinking of your handsome husband.’ The circle around her laughed. ‘I remember what it was like, so many years ago.’ Letty gave a melodramatic sigh, her eyes twinkling. ‘I couldn’t stop thinking about my man either. He was handsome back then, too.’ She chuckled and shook her head. ‘But now he’s had too many of his own baked goods.’ She pouted good-naturedly. Anyone could see that Letty Weldon was still madly in love with her baker husband. ‘Enjoy it while it lasts, my dear.’

  The others joined in with their stories and advice, reliving their own early days of marriage with much laughter. It was a good way to pass the time as they sewed and their morning went quickly. Too soon, it was time to pack up sewing baskets. The other women had lunches to prepare and children to take care of. Afternoons were hardest for Pavia, though. Most days, Cam wasn’t home until dinner and Mrs Bran was sometimes too efficient. There was little for her to do other than nap and sew. That would change when the baby came, of course. But for now, it was a lonely time.

  ‘We seem to have lost some of our initial closeness,’ Pavia lamented to Letty on their walk home. It had become their habit over the weeks to walk and talk as far as the fork in the road and Pavia was grateful for the private time with her new friend. ‘Cam has his own routine during the day and I have mine. I seem to only see him at night.’ After breakfast, Cam spent mornings in the little office, taking care of correspondence and who knew what else? Then, he’d ride out for who knew where and come back in the evening, sometimes sweaty with dirt and dust, both he and his horse lathered. When she enquired about his day, he said very little, choosing instead to focus on her day.

  ‘It’s all part of learning to live together,’ Letty assured her. ‘The early days aren’t all fun and games.’ She laughed. ‘Even though it seems like that when we remember them. We might tell tales of hot romance, but there are practical issues, too. I remember getting used to a baker’s schedule. My husband got up well before dawn to start the bread and then he went to bed early. I wasn’t used to that. It was hard to adjust my schedule to his, otherwise we’d have had no time together.’ Letty winked. ‘We certainly wouldn’t have had four strapping sons.’ They laughed together and then Letty sobered. ‘It will come, though. You will both find your rhythm together. Give it time.’

  Pavia hoped that was the truth. She wasn’t sure her situation with Cam was only about finding a rhythm. She was glad when they reached the fork and parted ways. There was more on her mind, but she felt she couldn’t discuss it without sharing too much, without betraying Cam. Letty’s husband didn’t wake in the middle of the night and pace the floor until dawn. Letty’s husband didn’t cry out with nightmares he refused to discuss beyond the basics. Letty’s husband wasn’t consumed with a secret life she knew nothing about. She might be exaggerating there, but Cam sent so many letters it seemed there must be a whole other life he was living.

  Letty said to give it all time, but Pavia wasn’t sure she had the time to give. Bakers didn’t share their time with the army. Cam’s leave would be over in a month and they still hadn’t discussed what happened then. Would she go with him? Would he stay here? Would he leave her here? Would he be home when the baby was born? Would he even come back? Those questions could no longer be set aside. They needed to be answered, soon.

  At the house, Mrs Bran had left the post on the front console. Pavia sifted through it, a sinking feeling in her stomach. Cam wrote letters and people wrote back, people she didn’t know, people he didn’t discuss with her. No one wrote to her. She set the post down. She would take it into Cam’s office after lunch.

  It was silly to be dismal about the post, she told herself as she sat down to the meal Mrs Bran had prepared for her. She didn’t have a lot of correspondence in general. No one but family wrote to her when she’d been at Mrs Finlay’s. Her mother had written once a week, her letters full of encouragement, to keep her chin up, to study hard, to not let the other girls make her disheartened. Pavia missed those letters now. Those letters reminded her she was connected to someone, somewhere. These days, her only connection
was to Little Trull and that was a new, fragile bridge. She couldn’t pour her heart out to Letty Weldon and the sewing circle. She didn’t know them well enough. She didn’t want to become fodder for gossip and she certainly didn’t want to give Mrs Browning anything to nod her head over and say, ‘I told you so, those foreign types...’

  Pavia buttered a slice of bread. Being alone shouldn’t be that hard. She’d been alone before at Mrs Finlay’s. The girls had been far more reticent to befriend her than the ladies of Little Trull. The women of Little Trull were not bothered by what society thought and that had opened a great window of opportunity for her here. Mrs Finlay’s girls felt they had more to lose by associating with her, that society would judge them and they were right. Society wasn’t ready for a mixed-blood heiress in its midst.

  Oh, how those girls would be laughing now. Her life had turned out far differently from the one even she’d imagined for herself. Mrs Finlay’s Academy had prepared her for the life of a peer’s wife. Her own dreams had been to travel, to return to India. Neither were anywhere near the life she was living in Little Trull: church on Sunday, sewing circles on Wednesday and a husband she only saw at night, a husband she was desperate to know.

  Pavia pushed her lunch plate away, her appetite gone. She was being maudlin and unappreciative. So what if things had turned out differently? She’d have a baby to love. Pavia put a hand to her mostly flat stomach. Would it kick soon? That was something else she missed. Who could she turn to with her worries and questions? The ladies in the village were eager to advise her, but they were new friends, women she didn’t know well just yet, not even Letty. It was hard to confide in them about something so personal and it was another reminder just how alone she was even when she was surrounded by people. These days, even when she was with her own husband, the one person she ought to feel closest to.